| Developer: | Maxis | | | Release Date: | 2000 | | | Systems: | PC, Mac |
This week on Super Adventures, I'm playing The Sims! The original game from the year 2000, installed right off the CD I bought and played it from years ago. In fact I don't even think you can buy this digitally, which sucks. I haven't got any of the expansions but from what I've heard I'm probably better keeping my installation light. At least if I want to avoid suffering long loading times and crashes.
My Super Adventures gimmick for this year is 'games that have appeared on a top ten list' and I found The Sims on an old list of bestselling PC games ever, right up at number 1. It kicked the ass of all the previous 'Sim' games like SimCity and SimAnt, and I can see why. It's pretty much the most relatable video game ever made as it's simulating everyone's normal life, to a degree that no game had ever managed up to this point. This time you're controlling the people who live in the SimCity, the tiny Sims that complain about crime and traffic all the time, and you get to dress them up and buy them microwaves and stuff!
To be honest I've been meaning to write about the game forever, but it's always been too daunting for me. Other people always manage to construct insane narratives around their Sims' lives and I know my own playthrough is going to be depressingly sedate and uneventful by comparison. I just don't have it in me to torture my little computer people! I'm not going to let them use the oven and burn the house down, I'm not going to seal them up in a wall in a puddle of their own urine, and I'm definitely not going to build a swimming pool and then delete the steps when they're in. So really, what's even the point of this?
But eventually I came to an epiphany: if nothing interesting happens then that's the game's fault, not mine! I'm just going to play it as boring and normal as possible and if see if the various interacting simulations can give us some entertainment. C'mon game, amuse me!
